Monday, October 08, 2007

"... the Taliban is perhaps the most militantly religious militia on earth. At checkpoints around the city [of Kabul], its fighters were searching cars for magazines and cassettes. I saw videotapes and audiotapes festooning a tree near one such checkpoint, and assumed they were pornographic, or rock and roll, or some kind of anti-Taliban propaganda. But I learned that the objective of the fighters is in fact much wider. They are searching for anything that depicts the human face or any of God's creatures. In no other Islamic society have the new revolutionary authorities gone so far."

- Michael Ignatieff, The Warrior's Honor: Ethnic War and the Modern Conscience (1998), pp 150-51.

Taliban First Commandment jurisprudence, 2007:

Osama Bin Laden plans to emerge from the shadows to taunt the United States again in a video message marking the sixth anniversary of the September 11 attacks, US-based monitoring services said on Thursday. The video from the world's most wanted man would be the first such appearance by the Saudi extremist since October 2004, when he threatened new attacks against the United States just days before a US election. "The SITE Intelligence Group has learned that a new video message is forthcoming from the head of Al-Qaeda" on the 9/11 anniversary, said the group, which monitors extremist websites and publications. The Al-Qaeda network's media arm announced the video in a notice posted on jihadist forums... The video of the soft-spoken Al-Qaeda leader who has claimed credit for the 9/11 attacks will be closely watched with every word and visual detail analyzed and dissected by intelligence agencies in Washington and around the world... Al-Qaeda now promotes itself in numerous videos and web postings but Bin Laden retains a low-profile, staying out of sight while issuing only occasional statements. Thursday's online notice included a photo of Bin Laden in which his black beard did not have the usual streaks of gray. He was also not wearing a camouflage jacket as in previous appearances..."